This Article was featured on Richard Billie’s AllThingsPoliticalToday.com and was written by Phil Nothstein

As U.S. troops left Iraq, the media focused on three important numbers in the war: the cost in soldiers who were killed, the cost in soldiers who were wounded and the cost in dollars.  Clearly these are important and critical numbers but there are three other numbers that are just as important.

The first number would be the oil in Iraq which is extremely important, and in fact, critical for the world economy.  When Libya went off line, we saw the upward move in oil which in turn, affected the world economy.  Iraq has oil reserves that approach 150 billion barrels. In addition,  60% of the country has never been tested for geological potential.  Some believe Iraq has 200 billion barrels and others believe the number is closer to 250.  Even if Iraq only has 150 billion barrels, this is a number worth fighting for.

Protesters who hold up signs “no blood for oil” lack understanding about this precious resource that runs the world economy. Forbes magazine had an article on oil fields that were worth fighting for and their point was well made.  Oil fields are nothing more than money in the bank to unethical dictators and they should never be allowed to stand on top of these huge fields.  That oil is for the country’s people and the world economy, not for genocide or palaces.

The second number on Iraq is the number of true Al-Qaeda members that were killed or captured in Iraq.  This number was distributed by the United States military but not so much by the U.S. media.  Al-Qaeda sent 90 terrorists per month into Iraq over a seven year period.  Some even came in during 2002 just before the war.

True Al-Qaeda members are from the Middle East, where all the 9/11 hijackers were born and raised.  When the US went into Iraq, this was an open invitation to Arab Al-Qaeda members.  If you build it they will come, and come they did.  Because so many were captured, U.S. officials were able to trace them home and find even more Al-Qaeda members.

The total that were killed and captured during the Iraq war may be as high as 10,000. These were, perhaps, the most ruthless and dangerous people in the world. If the American people knew this number, many may change their minds on the success of the war.

Because of the war in Iraq, Bin Laden also told his terrorist troops to overthrow the Saudi government in order to catch the U.S. military off guard. Saudi Arabia uncovered the plot and stopped the rebellion before it could start.  The number of Al-Qaeda killed and captured in Saudi Arabia is hard to predict but the number may be well over 5,000.

Because of the Iraq War, Al-Qaeda is dying a slow death in the Middle East.

The third important number would be the number of people who died
because of Saddam Hussein.  This number is around 5 million.  Most decent people believe that anyone who has killed 5 million people should be hunted down and killed themselves. Saddam’s numbers outpace Bin Laden by 4.99 million.

Saddam Hussein was also the world’s number one environmental terrorist.  He blew up oil tankers, he poured oil into the Persian Gulf and he set oil fields on fire.  Nobody hurt the environment as badly as Saddam and he deserved death for this as well. Here’s another important consideration about Saddam Hussein. If he was alive today, Iraq would have a huge nuclear and chemical weapons program to combat his enemy, Iran.

The Iraq war was far less costly in lives than either Vietnam or Korea.  And really, the war was certainly less costly than the 420,000 troops lost during World War II.  The monetary cost of Iraq and the cost in troop loss will always be important numbers to consider. However, there are other numbers that show that Iraq was a victory by destroying the core enemy of the United States.  Al-Qaida said the main reason that they attacked America was because of Clinton’s bombing of Iraq in 1993, 1996 and especially 1998.  How fitting it is that Al- Qaida suffered their largest defeat in Iraq.